The F1 Blogger Blog

The Overtaking Working Group which is established by the FIA and a lead by Paddy Lowe (McLaren), Pat Symonds (Renault) and Rory Byrne (Ferrari) made a detailed study about how to increase the overtaking in Formula one and FIA has implement new regulations for 2009 in the light of their work. We will see many changes this year especially most of them will be in the aerodynamic area, but will these new regulations really increase the overtaking? Let’s try to find an answer;

Since there weren’t any major changes over the regulations for a very long time and there was an engine freeze, the only chance of gaining an advantage over the other teams was having very different winglets on the cars. This different aerodynamic equipments on the cars caused nothing but the increase in the dirty air flow for the car which is behind. Therefore overtaking has become very difficult. As a result of the new regulations confirmed by FIA the downforce levels were decreased about 50% by the changes made on front and rear wings and diffusers. In addition, the winglets and cranes on the cars are now prohibited. Since the races have not started yet, nobody really knows whether the new regulations will increase the overtaking or not.

There is a very little time left for the start of 2009 season and most of the Formula one fans are waiting the first race with a great curiosity because of the new regulations had taken place by FIA. The Overtaking Working Group (OWG) made a very detailed study about how to increase the overtaking in Formula one and has came up with some set of modifications to the regulations and FIA used these modifications as a base of their 2009 rule changes. As you can imagine most of the changes are in the aerodynamic area which enables cars can easily follow the car in the front and have a chance to make a move if it’s faster than the one in the front. As a result many rule changes are applied for 2009 season and both the appearance and the performance of the cars have changed radically according to the F1 cars before.

Fundamental differences are; wider and lower front wings, higher and narrower rear wings, lower and simple diffusers, slick tires, and KERS. Also the drivers are now allowed to change the front wing setting from their steering wheels and all the winglets on the cars are now banned. So Let’s look over the changes in detail if you want;